Networking equipment maker Nortel sacked 228 UK staff on Monday without a redundancy pay out.
Nortel Networks UK does not have to make redundancy payouts because it is in administration while its Canadian parent company is under bankruptcy protection. Those sacked will be eligible for a small statutory redundancy payment from …

E&Y

sucks but.

it's exactly what happens to everyone in the construction industry.. of all the architects, engineers etc that i know who lost their jobs of all get statutory minimum, or less like when my firm went bust.

the site builders etc usually get about 3 hours notice and paid if they are lucky.

hearing about IT guys for banks getting a month for every year served.. that'd be the day.

For the greater good

Poor folks

Lay-off

This is digusting. This is a dirty trick, a way of getting rid of the staff without having the pay them off.

All be warned, check your contracts of employment, because there is a little known situation known as "Lay-off" which is present in some IT contracts of employment. You need to read your employment contracts carefully.

Lay-off is something that is used in the construction industry a lot, but some IT companies are using it too. I know people to whom this has happened.

If there is a lay-off clause in the contract of employment, then the employer can invoke the clause. Sometimes the clause says "If there is a downturn in work you can be laid-off without notice and without pay"

And some employers are invoking precisely that clause.

They leave you without pay for long enough, hoping you will resign and get another job, and thereby avoid making a redundancy pay-out.

Now, whether the employee can claim constructive dismissal is a point the lawyers need to argue out.

"the one-time FTSE 100 firm that collapsed in January has a pension deficit of £1.5bn - more than five times the value of the shortfall carried in the company's last accounts.

...

there are a further 42,000 retired employee members of the firm's pension scheme

...

the Pension Protection Fund (PPF) is likely to take a £900m hit from the collapse of Nortel"

Peter Skyte @ Unite The Union (before that, at MSF) may be able to help you if you want a different starting point. Or maybe not, if the Nortel workers were foolish enough to trust the management promises/threats that they didn't need a union.

Shameless ...

France

Yikes, bad news

What are the laws like in Sweden for paying redundancy? My cousin works for them in Stockholm, would be very bad for her if she just got statuatory (if there is statuatory redundancy in Sweden that is)

E&Y

Severence pay is a privilege, not a right.

I've been caught in the layoff net at least six times. The last time I received any severance pay was 1981.

But I'll tell you what's disturbing: As reported by the Washington Post, more and more U.S. companies that lay off staff are trying to get out of paying penalties into the state's unemployment fund, by claiming that the employee was fired for cause...even if the employee had recently received nice raises and kudos for a job well done.

Occupy!!

re: redundancy

Why do some assets erm i mean people think they are somehow entitled to a big payout because they have seen a handful of new stories about execs and their golden parachutes; that is definitely not the norm. Boo hoo learn to take care of yourselves.

Nortel has been in bad shape for a while. Anyone seen any focussed nortel sales & marketing efforts or any competitive products lately? These situations are generally the result of a team effort it's not just 'management', the parent company, 'economic conditions' etc... Blame who you want but Darwin says it's usually just the worst of what dead flesh remains that's gets cut at this stage.